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An Invitation to Join the 



Alliance for Communications Democracy 



6 . . . 'increasing awareness 
of Community Television 
through educational 
programs and participation 
in court cases involving 
franchise enforcement and 
constitutional questions 
about access television. ' 



Become an Alliance Subscriber for $350/year and receive detailed reports on current court 
cases threatening access, pertinent historical case citations, and other Alliance activities. 

• Voting membership open to non-orofit access operations for an annual 
contribution of $3,600; 

• Assoicate, Supporter and Subscriber memberships available to organizations and 
individuals at the following levels; 

> AH iance Associate, $2500 - copies of all briefs and reports. 

> Alliance Supporter, $500 - copies of all reports and enclosures^ 

> Alliance Subscriber, $350 - copies of all reports. 

Direct membership inquiries to Rob Grading, Multnomah Community Television, 26000 SE Stark St., 
Gresham, OR 97038, telephone 503/667-7636, or email at rbrading@mctv.org 



For the past 1 years, the Alliance for Communications Democracy has been fighting to preserve and strengthen access. 
Though the odds against us have been high, and the mega-media, corporate foes well-heeled and powerful, time and again we've 
won in the courts. We can't continue this critical work without your support. With the ramifications of the 1996 Telecommunications Act 
only now beginning to manifest themselves, we must be vigilant if we are to prevail and preserve democratic communications. 
If not us, who? If not now, when? Please join the Alliance for Communications Democracy today! 




THIS ISSUE 



COMMUNITY 
MEDIA REVIEW 



SPUING 1999 
VOLUME 22, NUMBER 1 

CMR EDITORIAL BOARD 

Dirk Kerning, Chair 
Pat Gariinghouse, Information Services Chair 
Jeffrey Hansetl, Lucille Frasca Harrigan, 
Wallv Keniston, Jennifer A. Krebs, 
Charles Williams 

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF THIS ISSUE 

Dirk Kouing 

MANAGING EDITOR 

Tim Goodwin 

NATIONAL OFFICE 

Bunnie Riedel, Executive Director 
Margaret Juliano, 
Government Relations/Communications 

ALLIANCE FOR COMMUNITY MEDIA 
BOARD OF DIRECTORS 

Rob Brading, Laurie Cirivello, Judy Ctandali, 
Sue Dicipie, lohn Donovan, Pat Gariinghouse, 
David llawkswnrlli. Ric Hayes, 
Jim Horwood, Eitan Kusliner, Miki Lee, 
Serena Mann, Erik Moliberg, 
Kevin Reynolds, John Rocco, 
Debra Rogers, Ken Snider, 
Karen Toering, David Vogel 



Alliance 
for 




Community 
Media 



Community Media Review [ISSN 1074 90041 
is published quarterly by the Alliance for 
Community Media, Inc. Subscriptions $35 a 
year. Please send subscriptions, memberships, 
address changes, advertising and editorial 
inquiries to the Alliance for Community Media, 
666 11th St. NW, Suite 806, Washington, DC 
20001-4542. Telephone 202.393.2650 voice, 
202.393.2653 fax. Email: acm@ailiancecm.org or 
visit the Alliance for Community Media web site 
at www.alliancecm.org 

Requests for bulk orders considered in 
advance of publication. Contact the national 
office for rates and delivery. 

Copyright ©1999 by the Alliance for Com- 
munity Media, Inc. Prior written permission of 
the Alliance for Community Media required for 
all reprints or usage, 

Produced through the studios of 

(jRy media inc. 



OPENERS 



A Commitment to Help Shape the Future, Bunnie Riedel 2 

Technology Alone Won't Create Media Democracy, Rob Brading 4 

A Position for Internet Access, New CMR Editorial 
Board Members, Up & Coming, Seeking Input 5 

Alliance National Board listing 6 
COMMUNITY MEDIA: POWER TOOLS FOR CHANGE 



Community Media: Power Tools for Change, Dirk Koning 7 

The Next Big Bang: What Could It Mean, USA Today 8 

MA in Television/Video for Development, 

Su Braden and Patricia E. Norrish 10 

New in Print - Subject to Change: Guerrilla 

Television Revisited, Deirdre Boyle 11 

Microradio & Internet Radio: A Powerful 
Synergy for Community Organizers, Bob Russell 12 

Benton Open Studio Project: Strenghtening the Arts 
Community through Communication Technology, Jan Koopmun 14 

Social Media Movements in Mesoamerica, Jeff Smith 16 

Building Capacity through Community 
Video Training, jesikah maria ross 18 

Citizen Network Project in Brazil, Rodrigo Ortiz Assumpcao 22 

The Community Media Files: i- Contact Video Network, 
WebRing, Aboriginal Peoples Television Network 23 



As the journal of the Alliance for Community Media, Community Media Review shall support the 
Alliance mission by providing: a comprehensive overview of past, present and future issues critical 
to the Alliance and its membership; vigorous and thoughtful debate on those issues; and a venue for 
members and like-minded groups to present issues critical to the Alliance. 



mi 



From the Executive Director 

A Commitment to Help Shape the Future 



We have proven what can be done 
when technology and funding are 
made available to meet community 
needs. We need to hold up these 
achievements and call for similar 
measures across technologies. 




by Bunnie Riedel 

Executive Director 

Alliance for Community Media 

In Fuzhou China, two brothers capi- 
talized on an entrepreneurial idea. Chen 
Zhui and Chen Yan reckoned they could 
use free calls to the United States via the 
Internet to entice potential customers 
into their electronics store. They even 
went so far as setting up a phone service 
which sold calls to the United States at a 
fraction of the cost of the state owned 
monopoly, China Telecom. These efforts 
landed the two in jail and caused their 
equipment to be seized amid accusa- 
tions that they were "endangering 
national security," and committing a 
"new type of a crime," 

China stands at the brink of a 
telecommunications explosion unseen 
in the rest of the world. Its growth of the 
number of "fixed main" telephone lines 
is almost forty percent per year. Perhaps 
because of sheer scale of population and 
vast geography, only nine percent of 
China's people have routine access to a 
phone. At the center of China's entry into 
the information age stand old monopo- 
lies heavily protected by the state. It is a 
situation that has been described as 
"feudal." Pang Hongyi, a senior engineer 
with the State Administration of Radio, 
Film and Television, says "It is controlled 
by a small gang of people who are hold- 
ing the whole country back." 

The Chinese telecommunications 
monopolies and their refusal to open up 
their markets to competition stands in 
stark contrast to the merger mania going 
on in this country. As I write this article, 
a drama is being played out in munici- 
palities affected by the AT&T/TCI merg- 
er. At question is whether broadband 
internet access will be open or closed. 
AT&T/TCI says access is open when con- 
sumers can use their @Home service as 
die gateway to other internet providers 
(as long as you pay) and we say con- 
sumers shouldn't, have to be double- 
dipped or forced to buy an internet 
provider they don't want. The FCC insists 
that this is not a merger issue and local 
municipalities such as Multnomah and 



Portland (Oregon) have refused to 
approve the transfers because they view 
this issue as critical to the terms of the 
merger. 

At some point in the not too distant 
past, wasn't there a promise made about 
"increased competition" and consumer- 
options? 

Competition and consumer pricing 
aside, in January the Alliance formed a 
"Position for Internet Access," which 
states in part that we "oppose any effort 
to stifle and limit the public's access to 
technology, information and media. 
Additionally we oppose defining propri- 
etary control and ownership of transmis- 
sion systems in ways that limit access to, 
and providers of, information." 

I recently attended a forum which 
was billed as being about electronic 
access and bridging the "digital divide." 
Thinking I would be in a room full of 
people who wanted to discuss economic 
justice and how we move from an indus- 
trial-based economy to a technology- 
based economy while minimizing the 
casualties of such a monumental shift, I 
prepared my remarks to reflect the 
Alliance's position on "electronic green- 
space" and access for all. I was some- 
what surprised to find the room filled 
with so many industry representatives 
and the focus to be on deregulation and 
against universal service. Listening to the 
other presentations, I nervously realized 
that the other conference participants 
were not going to like what I had to say. 
That thought was fleeting, however, as I 
realized that maybe the other conference 
participants needed to hear what 1 had 
to say. The model of Public, Educational 
and Governmental (PEG) access may not 



be perfect, but at least it is based on an 
assumption that a certain portion of 
electronic media should be set- aside for 
use by, for and of die public. It is based 
on an assumption that communities and 
individuals will be empowered by access 
to media, thereby creating stronger com- 
munities and more capable individuals. 

1 shrink from drawing direct compar- 
isons between the story of state monop- 
oly control in China and the interesting 
state of merger mania going on in this 
country. There are many factors affecting 
either one, including cultural, social, his- 
torical, economic and political. But, the 
common thread which runs through 
these stories is that the future of either 
society will be greatly shaped by the free- 
flow of information or the lack thereof. 

We are in a unique position in the 
access community because we have a 
track record of over 30 years of growth, 
development and delivery. We have 
proven what can be done when technol- 
ogy and funding are made available to 
meet community needs. We need to hold 
up these achievements and call for simi- 
lar measures across technologies. Public, 
Educational and Governmental (PEG) 
access did not come about because the 
"market" provided it — it was fought for, 
demanded and rallied around. The pio- 
neers of PEG were not content to wait for 
the crumbs from the table, they required 
a seat at the banquet. As we move for- 
ward, into convergence and the as yet 
unseen developments of the next few 
decades, we should commit to do no 
less. It is an exciting and extraordinary 
opportunity to be a part of shaping the 
future of our society. 



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You Don't Want to Miss the..,. 



1999 Alliance for Community Media 
International Conference & Trade Show 




CinCiJinall, USA 

<3 



July 7 - 10, 1999 
Cincinnati, Ohio 
Omni Netherland Plaza Hotel 



Alliance 
for 

a Community . 
5^1 Media 



▲ Over 70 workshops for community media professionals and volunteers 

■ ■ ■ . . 

A Hometown Video Festival Awards 
A Trade Show 
A International Reception & Screening 
A Gorilla Party at the Cincinnati Zoo 



Look for the Early Bird' brochure in the next few weeks 
or log on to our website for more information at: www.alliancecm.org 



From the Alliance Chair 



Technology Alone Won't Create Media Democracy 



People in the community media 
movement understand that technology 
by itself won't create media democracy, 
won 't mend our societal ills. It's tempting 
to believe that technology by itself will 
create an electronic green space but his- 
tory has convincingly demonstrated 
that... commercial interests will consume 
our electronic public green space. 




by Rob Brading 

Alliance Chairman and Executive 
Director of Multnomah Community TV 

When there's less air in one of my car 
tires than in my lungs or the hattery has 
less uumph than I do after a day at 
17,000 feet, I spend more than a few 
minutes swearing. At my car. I doubt its 
feelings are hurt. I'm trying to communi- 
cate, but the car's not listening. 

I don't know if trees falling in desert- 
ed forests make noise, but communicat- 
ing, like tangos, takes two. My car can't 
interpret what I'm saying. If I were 
swearing at someone - a friend, a col- 
league, you - you' d interpret what V m 
saying and that would give it meaning. 
The interpretation might not be what I 
intended and there might be more mis- 
communication than communication, 
but still we'd be communicating. 

We stand on the near side of the digi- 
tal phase of the electronic communica- 
tions age and our ability to communi- 
cate, the way in which we communicate, 
and how we do so effectively has radical- 
ly changed. We're told that electronic 
communications not only makes com- 
munications easier but will solve our 
communications problems. Rather than 
swearing at cars, convergence, data bits, 
compression and so on - and on - occu- 
py our everyday conversation. But how 
many folks know a scuzzy drive from a 
firewire from a fire cracker? Or care? 
Technobabble seems to have replaced 
psychobabble as the language for the 
new millennium. 

The folks who make those claims 
have a Field of Dreams philosophy. If you 
build it they will come. Dreamers believe 
that the vast and growing web of elec- 
tronic communications - fax, telephony, 
the Internet, the Web, data communica- 
tions, satellite transmissions - will rein- 
vigorate and heal our democracy, that 
apathetic and apolitical citizens will 
become energized activists who partici- 
pate in and transform political life. For 
Dreamers the web of electronic commu- 
nications does not merely enhance par- 
ticipation but becomes the actual agent 
of democracy. Democracy and participa- 



tion will exist because of the electronic 
web. 

For some Dreamers the electronic 
datasphere is even more. Economic, 
environmental, social, and even psycho- 
logical problems will be eliminated by 
the electronic communications web. The 
world will be transformed. For these 
folks, we've destined to move from our 
material world to a virtual one. Being 
electronically connected will become 
reality. 

In contrast to Dreamer tedmo-utopi- 
anism, people like Bill McKibben {The 
Age of Missing Information) and Daniel 
Kemmis {Community and the Politics of 
Place) believe that community is tied to a 
geographic place, that electronic com- 
munication technology can alter the 
course of community for the better, but 
successful communities are tied to place 
and the regular face-to-face interaction 
among human beings that comes from 
living together in the same place. 

People in the community media 
movement understand that technology 
by itself won't create media democracy, 
won't mend our societal ills. It's tempt- 
ing to believe that technology by itself 
will create an electronic green space. 
History has convincingly demonstrated 
that, as Bob McChesney eloquently stat- 
ed at his key note at the Alliance's 
national conference in Milwaukee, com- 
mercial interests will consume our elec- 
tronic public green space. 

No technology is neutral and we can't 
trust any technology to benefit our com- 



munities if we don't play an active role in 
determining how it's used. The form and 
shape of technology have consequences. 
That automobile, other than costing me 
a bundle every year, has a profound 
effect on my life, on collective fuel con- 
sumption, on the roads it's driven on, and 
on the sense of freedom the car has given 
us. That automobile alters our society, 
sometimes for the better and sometimes 
for the worse. There's no invisible hand 
that automatically makes technology 
work on our behalf. 

The Alliance is about creating, pre- 
serving and nurturing that electronic 
green space. As the Alliance has grown as 
an organization, media literacy and com- 
munity and economic development have 
taken a regular place in our conversation. 
Our very name tells us that we've moved 
as we've come to understand that being 
a Dreamer is not enough. We started out 
as a federation of television program- 
mers. Today we've moved into the elec- 
tronics and digital age and call ourselves 
the Alliance for Community Media. Our 
very name tells the us and the world that 
we're about more than television pro- 
gramming and more than simply provid- 
ing access to technology. 

Rob Brading is chairman of the Alliance 
for Community Media and executive direc- 
tor of Multnomah Community Television in 
Gresham, Oregon, rhrading@mctv.org, tele- 
phone 503.667. 7636. 



4©H 



UPe COMING 

April 29-May 1 - North West 
Regional Conference - Ashland, 
OR. 

May 15-16 - Mid-Atlantic 
Regional Conference - 
Westminster, MD. 

May 20-22 - Cancelled^ 
Central States Regional 
Conference. 

May 13-15 - South East 
Regional Conference - Univer- 
sity of Tampa ,Tampa, FL. 

July 5-6 - Alliance national 
board meeting, Cincinnati, OH. 

July 7-10 - 1999 Alliance for 
Community Media International 
Conference & Trade Show - 
Cincinnati. 

October 21-23 -Central 
States Regional Conference. - 
Michigan City, IN. 

November 1 7-20 - National 
board meeting, Tucson, AZ. 



New Members Named 
to CMR Editorial Board 

Lucille Frasca Ffarrigan and 
Wally Keniston were named to 
the Community Media Review 
Editorial Board at the national 
board meeting of the Alliance in 
March. 

Their terms will run until 
November 2001. 

Lucille is a consultant and 
free lance writer, currently work- 
ing with the Montgomery [MD] 
County Council to research and 
make recommendations on the 
future of public, education and 
I government access channels 
there. 

WaJiy is cable access facility 
coordinator for Windham [NH] 
Community Access Television 
and the owner of a used book 
store. 



Sponsors Needed for 
International Guests 
at July Conference 

Interested in a global per- 
spective on community media? 
You can do your part in support 
of international participation in 
this year's Alliance International 
Conference and Trade Show, 7- 
10 July in Cincinnati, by spon- 
soring a guest from abroad. 

For details on what your 
center can do, contact Joyce 
Miller, Cincinnati Community 
Video, at 513.651.4171. 

An international reception 
[ featuring video productions 
from abroad is planned for 10 
July of the conference at 
Cincinnati's Aronoff Center. 

Among the nations repre- 
sented to date are Britain, 
Ireland, South Africa, Brazil, 
Italy, Sweden, Israel, 
Netherlands, and Germany. 



Seeking Input 

IMPACS - The Institute for 
Media, Policy and Civi! Society 
[Vancouver, Canada] is working 
with members of the Canadian 
government to draft an opera- 
tional framework to guide poli- 
cy on media and peacebuilding. 

IMPACS is looking at media 
development in pre-conflict, 
conflict and post conflict situa- 
tions. If you have any articles, 
case studies, or thoughts on 
when it is appropriate to invest 
in media development as a 
peacebuilding strategy, contact 
Shauna Sylvester, Executive 
Director, IMPACS [Institute for 
Media, Policy and Civil Society], 
Suite 910, 207 W. Hastings St., 
Vancouver, B.C. Canada V6B 
1H6; telephone 604-687-7408; 
fax. 604-683-8536; email at 
shaunas@impacs.bc.ca or 
sylvest@planeteer.com 



A POSITION FOR INTERNET ACCESS 



jfthe past few years, media and telecommunications com- 
'panies have been merging at a break-neck speed. 
Deregulation within these industries has created fewer and 
larger corporations, each providing a multitude of services across 
and within telecommunications technologies. Corporate control 
of these industries and these portals to information pose a chal- 
lenge to public space, public dialogue and the public interest. 

The recent merger of AT&T and TCI highlights an emerging 
trend toward exclusionary corporate control of the broadband 
infrastructure, the closure of access to information and the selec- 
tive confinement of this access to affiliated internet service 
providers. 

The Alliance for Community Media opposes any effort to sti- 
fle or limit the public's access to technology, information or 
media. Additionally we oppose defining proprietary control and 
Dtmership of transmission systems in ways that limit access of 
users to, and providers of, information, 

Our advocacy of this position is rooted in a historic mission 
to uphold the First Amendment guarantee of free speech, a dedi- 
cation to community control of local resources and a commit- 
ment to complete access to the widest diversity of information 
sources and services. This position is punctuated by our organi- 
zational emphasis on localism and the decentralization of com- 
munications media. 

We advocate for a national policy which encourages the 
broad dissemination of information and knowledge to all people. 
Such a national policy spurs economic development, creates 
equal opportunity for all citizens and strengthens our democratic 
traditions. Experience has proven that the inequitable distribu- 
tion of telecommunications widens the disparity of education, 
civic participation, economic growth and opportunity among 
our nations' citizens. 



In any given locale, there is a danger that a single telecom- 
munications delivery system will operate as a monopoly — limit- 
ing the development of multiple user options, suffocating com- 
petition and a free market structure. This free market structure 
warrants the defense of producers and consumers of communi- 
cations services that are not affiliated with the operator or its 
parent corporation. 

As a local franchise issue, the Cable Act provides that cable 
companies are to be responsive to the needs and interests of the 
local community. The Act assures that cable systems provide and 
are encouraged to provide, the widest diversify of information 
sources and services to the public. The Act recognizes and 
upholds the First Amendment rights of the public as viewers and 
as speakers. 

Additionally, the Act permits municipalities to disapprove of 
an acquisition of a cable system that would eliminate or reduce 
competition in the delivery of cable services. This provision 
would include the power of the local franchise authority to place 
appropriate conditions on such an acquisition. 

Decisions about internet access through the cable systems 
can be made at the local level as a matter between the franchis- 
ing authority and the cable system operator. This focus on local- 
ism ensures that cable services reflect local interest and meet 
local needs. 

Non-discriminatory internet access to cable systems should 
be no different than other access provisions in current federal 
law, such as "must carry" provisions, leased access, program 
access and Public, Educational and Governmental (PEG) access. 
The Alliance for Community Media views these provisions and 
local franchising as a simple and effective regulatory model 
which should be applied to all entities providing direct video ser- 
vices, regardless of federal regulatory status. 




©B5 



1999-2000 ALLIANCE BOARD OF DIRECTORS 



OFFICERS 



Chair, At Large 



Rob Brading 

Executive Director, 

Multnomah Community TV 

26000 SE Stark St., Gresham, OR 97030 

Voice: 503.667.7636, x318 / Fax: 503.6G7.7417 

email: rbrading@mctv.org 

Ric Hayes Vice Chair, At Large 

Directoi of Cable Operations, 

Miami Valley Cable Council 

1195 E. Alex-Bell Road, Cenlerville, OH 45459 

Voice: 937.438.8887x3025 / Fax: 937.438.8569 

email: rhayes@mvcc.net 

Karen Toering Secretary, At-Large 

Executive Director, 

Greensboro Community Television 

P.O. Box 1684, 211 N. Green St. 

Greensboro, NC 27402 

Voice: 910.373.1 100 / Fax: 910.373.1101 

email: KarenT349@aol.com 

John Donovan Treasurer, At Large 

35 Newell Rd., Auburndale, MA 02466 
Voice: 617.661.6900x123 / Fax: 617.661.6927 
email: jwd@wn.net 



REGIONAL CHAIRS 



Erik MoTlberg Central States Ch air, 

Chair of Chairs 

Access Fort Wayne 
900 Webster St., Ft. Wayne IN 46802 
Voice: 219.421.1248, / Fax: 219.422.9688 
email: erikm66345@aol.com 

David Vogel Southeast Chair 

General Manager, 

Community Television of Knoxvillc 

912 S. Gay Street, Ste. 600, 

Knoxville, TN 37902 

Voice: 423.521.7475 / Fax: 423.971.4517 

email: ctv@use.usit.net 

Patricia Garlinghouse Southwest Chair, 
Information Services Chair 

Access Houston 

3900 Milam, Houston, TX 78767 
Voice: 713.524.7700 / Fax: 713.524.3824 
email: patg@accesshouston.org 

John A. Rocco Mid-Atlantic Chair 

DATV 

280 Leo St., Dayton, OH 45404 

Voice: 937.223.5311 / Fax: 937.223.2345 

email: 102546.526@compuserv.com 

Debra Rogers Northeast Chair 

Executive Director, 

Falmouth Community Television, FCTV13 

310 Dillingham Ave., 

Falmouth, MA 02540 

Voice: 508.457.0800 / Fax: 508.457.1604 

email: snider@i]nagina.coni 



Ken Snider Northwest Chair 

Multnomah Community Television 
26000 SE Stark St., 
Gresham, OR 97030 

Voice: 503.491.7637, x325 / Fax: 503.491.7417 
email: kcn@mctv.org / 
www. teleport.com / -mctv/ 

David Hawksworth Midwest Chair 

Executive Director, 

Community Access Television of Salina 

410W.AshSt., 

Salina, KS 67401 

Voice: 785.823.2500 / Fax:785.823.2599 
email: daveh@salnet.org 

Laurie Cirivello Western States Chair 

Executive Director, 

Santa Rosa Community Media Access Center 

1075 Mendocino Ave., 

Santa Rosa, CA 95402 

Voice: 707.569.8785 / Fax: 707.569.8786 



TANDING COMMITTEE CHAIRS 



Judy D. CrandaJI Org. Development Chair 

Wee 4 Tapes 
2290 84th St., 
Caledonia, MI 49316 
Voice: 616.698.9822 
email: jdcrandall@aol.com 

Eitan Kushner Conference Planning Chair, 

At-Large 

Executive Director, Evanston Community TV 
1285 Hartrey Avenue, 
Evanston IL 60202 

Voice: 847.869.2510 / Fax: 847.869.2513 
email: kushner@ectv.com 



AT-LARGE 



Kevin Reynolds At-Large 

5520 North Bloomfieid Rd. 
Canandaigua, NY 1 4424 
Voice: 716.394.3028 
email: reynolds@netacc.net 

Miki Lee At-Large 

'Olelo; The Corporation 
for Community Television 
1122 Mapunapuna St., 
Honolulu, 111 96819 

Voice: 808.834.0007, xl31 / Fax: 808.836.2546 

Sue Diciple At-Large 

President, Management Resources 

2223 NE 47th Avenue, 

Pordand, OR 97213-1911 

Voice: 503.287.9345 / Fax: 503.287.9293 

email: sdiciple@aoI.com 



DISCRETIONARY APPOINTEES 



James Horwood Legal Affairs Appointee 

Attorney-at-Law, 

Spiegel & McDiarmid 

1350 New York Ave, NW, #1 1 00, 

Washington, DC 20005-4798 

Voice: 202.879.4002 / Fax: 202.393.2866 

email: horvvoodj@spiegelmcd.com 



Serena Mann Equal Opportunity Chair 

General Manager 

Flagship Channel and Television Services 

0121 Tawes Fine Arts Bldg. 

University of Maryland 

College Park, MD 20742 

Voice: 301.405.3610 / Fax: 301.405.0496 

email: smann@deans.umd.edu 



'Talk Amongst Yourselves., 



Information, resources, 
networking and national office 
annotm cements are at your fingertips 
day or night. The Alliance hosts 
two listserves to help you: 

For all people interested in 
cfmtrniiiiity media (membership 
in the Alliance not required) 
sign on to: 
alliancv.-lvTum@igc.org 

For members only, we offer 

a moderated listserve at: 
atliaftce~annQunce@igc.org 



Useful Contacts 



Alliance for Community Media 
666 11th St. NW, Suite 806 
Washington, DC 20001-4542 
Telephone 202.393.2650 voice 

202.393.2653 fax. 
Email: acni@alliancecm.org 
www.alliancecm.org 

Federal Communications Commission 
The Portals 
445 12th St. SW 
Washington, DC 20024 
202.418.0200 voice 
202.418.2812 
www.fcc.gov 

Your Federal Legislators 

The Honorable Sen. 



United Stales Senate 
Washington, DC 20515 

The Honorable Rep., 



United States House of Representatives 
Washington, DC 20510 

on the web through 
http:/ / clerkweb.house.gov 

or call 202.224.3121 



6<M 



fji ji ^° y° u do for a living?" That question has been tough to answer in the land of 
§ /§ /community media. I describe public access and free speech, mention the training 
f # and television, skipping any references to cable TV since that sours the conversa- 
tion. But I think I finally have an answer. I am a social servant and community organizer spe- 
cializing in media applications. This issue of CMR is dedicated to all of you who help others 
use media as a power tool to dismantle myths and create community. 

In the first article Kevin Maney paints an illuminating portrait "can we have too much 
bandwidth?" We all know the problem of too little. "Masters in Television" was included to 
demonstrate a template of using video for development applications worldwide. While Maney 
looks ahead at the bandwidth boom, Deirdre Boyle takes us back to the roots of our movement 
in her profiled book, Subject to Change: 
Guerrilla Television Revisited. This history high- 
lights our movement and provides context for 
the next wave of Internet applications. Bob 
Russell reminds to us to seize microradio and 
Internet radio for community development 
with the same fervor of public access television. 
Citizens sharing - by all means possible. 

Is the Internet a soulless medium? The 
National Endowment for the Arts and the 
Benton Foundation think otherwise by funding 
centers across the nation to introduce artists to 

the Internet. Jan Koopman explains the Open Studio Project. We go underground with Jeff 
Smith as he visits the Zapatistas in Mesoamerica where camcorders are wielded as guns to 
expose atrocities and build honest images to counter world opinions. A sidebar on the Centro 
de Mujeres Comunicadoras Mayas has me saving up to join indigenous Guatemalan women in 
a three-week seminar on documentary media work on the shores of Lake Atitlan. Community 
video training with a new twist is presented by jessica maria ross as she applies progressive 
training techniques in a model program in Davis, CA. Rodrigo Assumpcao takes this issue 
home with a report from south of the equator about a community's initiative in providing citi- 
zen access to computer technology and sharing. 

Power tools, power people, and powerful results - by all means possible. 

— Dirk Koning, Editor-in-Chief 



COMMUNITY 

MEDIA 



wm «KEB1 



«7 




Editor's note: The following article pre- 
sents an interesting quandry... is there such 
a thingas too much bandwidth? The his- 
torical notion has clearly been no... never 
enough bandwidth. Just remember the 
early spin from the n uclear power indus- 
try.. .we will have so much energy stream- 
ing into our homes that it will be, "Top 
cheap to meter. "Bring it on! 

ou've been awed by the way ; . 
computing power keeps rocketing 
toward the heavens, wait until you 
see what's about to happen to 
communications power. 

People in the industry call it a 
bandwidth explosion. A stam- 
pede of new data communica- 
tions networks that have 
astounding capabilities will be 
turned on over the next four 
years. The pace of improvements 
in communications power will 
make computers look like don- 
keys on a towpath. 

Four companies — Qwest, 
Level 3, ITXC and Williams 
Communications — are building 
the equivalent of 80 AT&Ts in the 
U SA, according to North River : 
ventures. All their networks 
could carry Internet, voice or TV 
traffic. On top of that, AT&T, 
WorldCom and Sprint have 
begun work recently on new data 
networks, and technological advances 
are boosting the capabilities of the net- 
works by the day. Tn 1985, it took six 
fibers in a fiber-optic line to carry a sin- 
gle TV broadcast of a football game, says 
Howard Janzen, CF.O of Williams. Today, 
one fiber could handle .'ISO such broad- 
casts. 

The bandwidth explosion will send 
shrapnel flying everywhere. It could drive 
the cost of a long-distance phone call to 
1 cent a minute within a year, analysts 
say. Soon after, it should make full- 
fledged TV over the Internet possible, 
deconstructing the very identity of a TV 
channel. The bandwidth boom is already- 
sucking life out of the consumer personal 
computer software industry: Investment 
and talent are flying out of software and 
into Internet applications, says Netscape 
Communications co-founder Mark 
Andreessen. 

"Bandwidth is the drug of the day," 
says Dave House, president of Nortel. 
"Processor power (in computers) used to 



be the drug of the day." 

One nagging question is whether the 
boom will be too much bandwidth too 
soon, flooding the market before users 
need it, want it. or can get it through 
comparatively slow connections going to 
most homes and small businesses, 'those 
building the networks argue that there 
can never be too much bandwidth. Like 
new asphalt highways in busy suburbs, 
as soon as more bandwidth is built, peo- 
ple find new uses for it and it fills up. 




NEXT 
BANG 



WHAT COULD IT MEAN? 
]e LONG-DISTANCE, 

VIDEO EMAIL 

by Kevin Maney, USA TODAY 



I l ie other side, though, warns -of a 
■ coming shakeout. "If suddenly huge 
capacity conies on line,: there's going to 
be a bloodbath" because the ratio of 
price to performance "is going to go 
through the floor," says Francis 
Mclnerney of North River Ventures. That 
scenario could mean vicious price wars 
that might collapse long distance phone 
rates to almost nothing and lead to a new 
round of communications mergers that 
trump even megamergers such as Bell 
Atlantic and GTE. 
Explosion of networks 

Only a year ago, the bandwidth 
builders seemed a little nuts. Their con- 
cept was still fresh: create nationwide or 
worldwide networks based on the high 
speed and massive capacity of fiber 
optics and the flexibility of Internet- style, 
packet-switched technology. Such net- 
works could carry hundreds of thou- 
sands of times more traffic than is car- 
ried by existing networks and handle 
email, regular phone calls, Web pages, 



video and even high-definition television 
signals. 

High-profile start-ups such as Level 3 
and Qwest are betting more than S3 bil- 
lion each on that future. Taking a different 
approach, Craig McCaw's Teledesic is 
building a $9 billion space-based network 
with similar capabilities. More recently, 
traditional phone companies jumped on 
the bandwagon. Sprint announced its 
ION network; AT&T its INC network. 
Atl this capacity is scheduled to be 
turned on between now and 2002. 

Why place such bets? "It's not 
inconceivable that there will be a 
million-fold rise in Internet traffic 
by 2005," George Gilder, writer 
and bandwidth evangelist, told an 
audience at his September con- 
ference, Telecosm. "There's just an 
awesome explosion of traffic, 
which means an awesome explo- 
sion of bandwidth." 

Another driving force is 
advances in communications 
technology. For 20 years comput- 
ers have advanced to the beat of 
Moore's Law, which basically says 
that the power of a microproces- 
sor can double every i8 months 
while the price stays the same. 
During the same 20 years com- 
munications technology has been 
slow to change. No longer. 
"We are freeing communications 
technology from the clutches of Moore's 
Law," says Mukesh Chatter, CEO of 
Nexabit Networks. 

Out of the blue, Nexabit came tip with 
terabit switch technology that can man- 
age traffic on a network 100 times faster 
than current products on the market. In 
August, Nexabit picked up a $20 million 
investment from Vulcan Ventures, which 
is controlled by Microsoft co-founder 
Paul Allen. Now Nexabit is racing to beat 
Juniper Networks, another start-up that 
has a similar product. Juniper is backed 
by 3Com, AT&T, Lucent Technologies and 
Nortel. 

Such advances mean that new net- 
works can be far more efficient than older 
networks. So a Level 3 sees an opportuni- 
ty to steal business from older networks 
because it can charge less and still make a 
profit. Owners of older networks, such as 
AT&T and Sprint, realized they have to 
build newer networks to stay competitive 
with the upstarts. The cycle leads to the 



8 SIS 



"We'll broadcast off our camcorders. When you 
combine television with interactivity, you get a new 
medium" Mclnerney says. 



explosion of bandwidth. 

But all this new capacity brings with 
it a couple of problems. 

Too much or too little 

Problem one is sometimes known as 
the last-mile botdeneck. The major 
advances and investments have almost 
all been made in backbone networks — 
networks that carry traffic around cities, 
around the country or around the world. 
Almost all homes and small businesses 
are connected to those backbones by 
phone lines, which can handle just a 
trickle of data. It's as if the backbones are 
32-lane megahighways packed with cars, 
and nearly all the exit ramps are side- 
walks. 

Big corporations can afford better 
connections to the backbone. But corpo- 
rations can't provide enough traffic to 
keep all the new capacity busy. To fill the 
backbones, homes and small businesses 
will have to have big, fast connections, 
too. That will come from cable modems 
and high-speed phone lines, but both are 
only now rolling out. "For three to five 
years, we're going to be stuck with what 
we've got" in terms of bandwidth con- 
necting homes to backbones, says 
Armando Garcia, vice president of 
Internet media at IBM. 

If homes and small businesses end 
up stuck with their sidewalk-size connec- 
tions for too long, the communications 
companies could end up with a severe 
oversupply of capacity — a disaster for 
those companies. The companies, 
though, say that the capabilities their 
networks give the Internet will be so 
enticing, consumers will demand better 
connections and drive the companies 
that can supply them to move more 
quickly. 

'Are we building too much network?" 
asks Williams' Janzen. After Talking with 
Microsoft and others to gauge consumer 
interest, he says, "all the bandwidth 
being deployed won't even come close." 

Others aren't so sure. "They've built it, 
and they're hoping like hell people will 



come," says Mark Bruneau of 
Renaissance Worldwide. 

The message is the medium 

That brings up problem two. Some 
say that all the new bandwidth is a new 
medium, like television in its early days. 
To drive use of the medium, someone 
has to come up with a new kind of enter- 
tainment or information content that 
pulls people to that medium. But that 
doesn't seem to be happening yet. It's a 
chicken- and-egg problem, like IBM's 
Garcia, content people won't aim for the 
new medium until it's widely available; 
but it might not be widely available until 
new content gives people a reason to 
demand it. 

"There is a vacuum (bandwidth 
builders) hope will be filled by applica- 
tions developers," Bruneau says. 
"Someone has to take the lead." 

In the PC, as Intel made faster micro- 
processors, Microsoft worked in partner- 
ship to create software that would use 
that new capacity and give people reason 
to demand the latest PC. No hand-in- 
glove partnership like that is coming 
together in the high-bandwidth world. 

Yet the question is more "when" than 
"if" content will catch up with the net- 
works' capacity. America Online has 
launched a unit to develop high- band- 
width content. Road Runner and 
©Home, the cable modem companies, 
are searching for content that will drive 
use of their products. 

It could be that none have to look as 
far as they might think. 

"1 don't think applications are a big 
deal — it's straight TV" says researcher 
Mclnerney. Broadband Internet could 
cany TV signals to PCs or TV sets. 



Consumers could grab video from all 
over the world, just as they now get Web 
pages from anywhere. They could pluck 
individual shows off souped-up video 
Web sites. TV would never be the same. 
"We'll broadcast off our camcorders. 
When you combine television with inter- 
activity, you get a new medium," 
Mclnerney says. That might drive 
enough demands for the new communi- 
cations networks. 
Triumph or train wreck? 

If the twin problems get solved with- 
in these next four years, the effects could 
be phenomenal. 

The cost of communications would 
dive while capabilities soar, just as has 
happened with computing. Video 
phones and video e-mail could quickly 
catch on in mass markets, analysts say. 
Entertainment would become on- 
demand and interactive. Telecommuting 
would be easier since computer connec- 
tions from home could rival those in the 
office. Consumers and businesses would 
flock to the Net like never before. 

The communications companies 
would fill their networks to overflowing. 
Their big bets would prove right 
Founders of the start-ups — Level 3's 
James Crowe and Teledesic's McCaw — 
would become super-billionaires. 

If the problems don't get solved, 
expect a train wreck. Over supply would 
kill many of die start-ups amid ruinous 
price wars. The big players would merge 
to try to become more efficient and 
tighten up the market. The bright broad- 
band future would be put on hold, 
angering eager consumers. 

Either way, the bandwidth explosion 
should provide fireworks. "We don't know 
what will happen. We've never seen 
something that grows 10 times a year 
compounded," says Eric Schmidt, CEO of 
Novell. "This is the beginning of a very, 
very big thing." 

Copyright 1998, USA TODAY, 
Reprinted with permission. 



r 



"Are we building too much network?" asks 
Williams 1 Janzen, After talking with Microsoft and 
others to gauge consumer interest he says, "all the 
bandwidth being deployed won't even come close." 



en9 



At the University of Reading in the UK 





MASTERS IN TELEVISION/VIDEO FOR DEVELOPMENT 

Cross-disciplinary Course Links Development Studies with Media and Cultural Studies 

Editor's note: This update from the 
University of Reading in the United 
Kingdom presents a wonderful graduate 
school model where students use media as 
a capacity building tool. Dozens of stu- 
dents from dozens of different countries 
go to dozens of different countries to teach 
media literacy and applications to 
improve dozens of neighborhoods. Wh o is 
going to develop this here ? 

Vision and video can facili- 
tate informal learning, aid the 
retrieval of knowledge within 
communities, and enable people mar- 
ginalised by the mass media or by writ- 
ten literacy to express and represent 
themselves. It therefore has an impor- 
tant developmental role in both the 
North and the South which you will be 
able to explore through this Masters 
course. 

Who is it for? 

You may have a background of work in television and video 
production and wish to explore ways of using the medium devel- 
opmentally, with marginalised people and communities. 
Alternatively you may work in development and want to explore 
the uses of video and television in your own work. Either way, 
this course could be for you if you have a good first degree or 
equivalent and a serious interest in development communica- 
tion. 

Please note that craft or technical skills such as camera-work 
and sound recording are taught within this programme only in so 
far as they are necessary for the successful completion of the 
course work. It is not a vocational course in relation to the world- 
wide television industry. 
The course 

The course is cross-disciplinary, linking development studies 
with media and cultural studies. It is characterized by its use of 
participatory learning methods, including seminars, workshops 
and small group activities. Central to the programme are practi- 
cal field-work projects using video, in the UK and overseas. 

The course lasts 12 months; it extends over three university 
terms of 10 weeks each, the 13-week summer vacation and short 
vacations in December (4 weeks) and March/April (5 weeks] . 

The core modules, taken in the first term, form the founda- 
tion of the programme. This part of the course includes the 
acquisition (or upgrading) of practical video camera and editing 
skills and an introduction to field-work. In the second term a 
choice of three specialist options provides the opportunity to 
pursue individual interests from a wide range of topics in rural 
development, extension and training. 



Work on a fieid project begins in March, at the end of the sec- 



ond term, and carries through the summer term. You will work in 
a small group directly with a local community, aiming to enable 
community members to represent themselves through commu- 
nication processes including video in a way that facilitates their 
ability to take control of and transform their lives. 

The final term of your course is occupied mainly by preparing 
a dissertation, an extended essay of 10,000-12,000 words through 
which you pursue in detail some aspect of the course and field- 
work project which is of particular interest to you or relevance to 
your work. 

Assessment for the award of Masters degree is based on: 
A Assignments undertaken within each course module 

▲ A written examination (taken at the beginning of the second 
term) 

▲ A presentation of your field project peer-assessed by course 
members and graded by an external examiner 

▲ The dissertation. 

Course Directors 

Su Braden. Su Braden's principal concerns are with communica- 
tion amongst underrepresented peoples and between them and 
others in authority. She has experience of training and participa- 
tory video projects with both NGOs and government ministries, 
is the author of three books on community media, and has 
directed and produced documentary and drama-documentary 
programmes for Channel Four Television in the UK. 

Patricia E. Norrish, BA, PhD Reading. Pat Norrish's research 
interests are in interactive and participatory processes, and in 
issues relating to the production and presentation of communi- 
cation media (print, video, radio) for people of differing cultural 
backgrounds. Before joining AERDD she lived and worked in 



10 



Thailand, Ethiopia and Ghana and has 
recently undertaken consultancy and train- 
ing assignments in Kenya, Namibia, Sri 
Lanka and South Africa as well as in the 
UK, Europe and the United States. 

SCHEDULE 

First Term (October-December) 

Core modules: 

A Theories of Development, Society 
and Change 

▲ Organization, People and Change 

▲ Practical TV/video skills and fieldwork 

▲ Communications and Understanding 

▲ Culture and the Media 

▲ Participatory learning and action work- 
shop 

Christmas Vacation 

▲ Revision, reading and preliminary work 
on dissertation 

Second Term (January-March) 

Specialist options 

A Management of participatory media pro- 
jects, plus a choice of 3 modules from: 

▲ Extension methods in diffusion and 
technology transfer; 

▲ Gender planning for rural development; 

▲ Management of participatory learning 
interventions; 

▲ Social research methods; 

▲ Computer applications and statistics for 
research and evaluation; 

▲ Non-government organizations in rural 
development; 

A Planning and economic appraisal meth- 
ods; 

A Management information systems; 
A Participatory approaches to rural devel- 
opment 

Easter Vacation 
A Field Project 

Third Term (May-July) 

A Edit project video 

A Dissertation work 

A Project presentations and assessment 

A Final course evaluation 

Summer Vacation 

A Dissertation writing 

(deadline end August) 



For further information, contact Su Braden 
at The University of Reading, 3 Barley Gate, 
Whiteknights Road, PO Box 238, Reading RG6 
6AL, UK. Tel: + 44 (0)118 9875123; Telex; 847813 
RULIB C; Far. +44 (0)118 926 1244; 
or email at i.e.braden@reading.ac.uk 



NEW IN PRINT 

Subject to Change: Guerrilla Television Revisited 

By Deirdre Boyle, Oxford University Press,, 286 pages, ISBN 0-1 9-504334-0 

/ /before the Internet, camcorders and hundred channel cable systems, there 
oOwas guerrilla television," reads the book jacket. "Part of the larger alternative 
media tide which swept ure country in the late 1960s, guerrilla television emerged 
when the arrival of lightweight, affordable consumer video equipment made it 
possible for ordinary people to make their own television. Molded by the insights 
of theorists like Marshall McLuhan and Buckminster Fuller, influenced by the 
style of New Journalism practiced by Tom Wolfe and Hunter S. Thompson, and 
inspired by the content of the agonizing 
issues of the day, video guerillas plotted a 
Utopian program to change the structure of 
information in America. 

"In Subject to Change: Guerrilla 
Television Revisited, Deirdre Boyle tells the 
fascinating story of the first TV genera- 
tion r s dream of remaking television to 
include voices and visions absent from the 
broadcast media mix. The book opens by 
looking at the early underground video 
scene and its efforts at differentiating video 
from television and then explores how 
guerrilla television's more radical aspira- 
tions repeatedly were shipwrecked by the 
siren call of broadcasting. Interweaving the 
stories of three very different video collec- 
tives of the 1970s, Boyle focuses on the for- 
tunes of Broadside TV, University 
Community Video, and the best-known 
most controversial guerrilla television 
group of the decade, Top Value Television, 
or TVTV. Founded by Michael Shamberg, 
author of the 1971 manifesto Guerrilla 
Television, TVTV came into being to cover 
the 1972 presidential nominating conven- 
tions for cable television, and its brash, 
hour-long tapes turned the worlds of both 
independent media and network television 
on their heads. Selecting sacred cows as sacrificial victims to its satire, TVTV 
tackled power-seekers in the realms of politics, religion, sports, and entertain- 
ment. The group's signature irreverence changed the landscape of television and 
its roster of young talent included Bill Murray, Lily Tomlin, John Belushi, Harold 
Ramis, comedy writer and producer Allen Rucker, and Michael Shamberg him- 
self, producer of The Big Chill, Pulp Fiction, and other films. 

"Subject to Change concludes with an examination of the larger forces oper- 
ating in society that made creating an alternative system to commercial televi- 
sion virtually impossible. Boyle's story, a little-known chapter in the history of 
television, has keen implications for the future of free speech and public dis- 
course in America. Promised that the information superhighway will take us to a 
Utopia where electronic democracy will be ours, we may want to consider what 
happened to the last pilgrims to venture down that rocky road. 

Subject to Change is the clarion call to public access television today to take a 
stand, make a difference, and celebrate community to avoid being marginalized 
by consolidating commercial media. 'If we're not making television, it's making 
us.'" 

- Dirk Koning, Director, Community Media Center 



Subject to Change 

Guerrilla 
Television 



Revisited 




Deirdre Boyle 

"In the 1970s, during the 
astonishing rise of video as an 
independent medium of expres- 
sion, Deirdre Boyle was there as 
a gung-ho participant. In the 
1990s she is still there, now as a 
clear-eyed, amazingly meticu- 
lous chronicler of a turbulent 
period of media history, " 

- Erik Barnouw, Author, 
Media Maratlwn 



jyilCRORADIO INTERNET RADIO 

A Powerful Synergy for Community Organizers 



by Bob Russell 

/" jfe still about content. Good compelling content is what 
'■■■"/drives the need to have a medium for dissemination of 
{. S information. Perhaps you create an in-depth piece on a 
critical political issue in your community, an article correcting 
the misinformation from your area's corporate media or some 
other interesting bit of news, data, information, knowledge or 
wisdom. Whatever it is, you need a medium of dissemination. 

A technology that has become usable for people with access 
to computers and the Internet is audio programming or Internet 
Radio. The basic software to create and listen to audio programs 
via the Internet is available for free or real cheap. Of course you 
can get commercial software that ranges from a few hundred 
dollars to thousands, but it isn't needed to do good solid Internet 
audio. Many basic computers can be purchased which are audio 
ready in terms of hardware, or upgrades can be added to existing 
computers. For audio production your computer needs an input 
for a microphone for direct recording or audio input ports for 
connecting an external devices that you used to record your 
audio program. [See next pagel 

Audio on the Internet can be live, which is more expensive 
and technically challenging, or archives of radio programs, 
which is inexpensive and simpler technically. 

Creating radio programs as archives provides your audience 
with the convenience of listening to your program on demand at 
the time of their choosing. The listener can tell other people 
about it, who can then tune in at their convenience. Your pro- 
grams are there for anyone with Internet access 24 hours a day, 
seven days a week. And if they don't have their own computer 
they can arrange to go to a public library or other public facility 
with Internet access to listen to the program. 

Microradio, also known as "pirate broadcasting," is another 
technology that may be legal to use after years of struggle with 
the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). In late January 
1999, the FCC proposed new rules to permit low-power FM radio 
stations. Under these proposed rules, the FCC is defining 
Microradio as between 1 and 10 watts of power using the FM 
radio spectrum. For a few hundred dollars you can purchase the 
equipment to create a one-watt FM radio station that could 
cover an area of up to two miles. [See next pagel 

The value of information is often time sensitive. A simple 
example is: what is the value of the information about an avail- 
able seat on an airplane that has not taken off yet? It is worth at 
least the monetary value of the ticket price. But what is the value 
of the information about the empty seat once the airplane has 
taken off? It is worth nothing to the consumer, but has some 




Microradio and Internet radio used together can 
provide you and your community with a live broad- 
cast medium and an archived media on demand. 
This is powerful synergy for community organizers 
with limited access to the dominant corporate 
owned media that most communities rely upon. 



value to the airline for financial record keeping. So it's important 
to consider whether or not the information you're imparting is 
time sensitive. Thus, microradio is best for live broadcast of 
information that is time sensitive and Internet Radio archiving is 
best for audio information on demand, 

Microradio and Internet radio used together can provide you 
and your community with a live broadcast medium and an 
archived media on demand. This is powerful synergy for commu- 
nity organizers with limited access to the dominant corporate 
owned media that most communities rely upon. 

WebActive, www.webactive.com, is a good example of audio 
on-demand, a one-stop site for a smorgasbord of programs. Here 
you will find Jim Hightower Commentaries, CounterSpin (pro- 
duced by FAIR- Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting), Pacifica 
Network News, Radio Nation (produced by the folks that publish 
The Nation magazine) and more. These are professionally pro- 
duced programs that can give you a standard of radio program- 
ming to strive for. 

A-Infos Radio Project and Free Speech Internet Television are 
sites (see next page) that contain audio archives produced by 
community activists and nonprofit organizations. Both sites 
allow free space for audio on-demand programs. You can pro- 
duce your own program and upload it to one of their sites. Your 
program will then have an Internet address that you can publi- 
cize in your local community. 

While I was finishing this article I was listening to author 
Danny Schecter talking about the electronic media's impeach- 
ment coverage on Radio Nation via the Internet. I could have 
been listening to one of your programs - go for it! 

Bob Russell is co-director of the educational, non-profit 
Neahtawanta Center, 1308 Neahalwanta Road, Traverse City, Ml 
49686. Email him at. center@traverse.com or visit www.nrec.org 



The Federal Communications Commission Wants You!. ..or at least your comments on micro radio. 
You have until June 1, 1999 to file your comments with the FCC. Don't think your puny, scrawny 
little voice doesn't matter.. .as the African fable goes, "Spiders united can tie up a lion, " 
File comments in print: Federal Communications Commission, The Portals, 
445 12th St. SW, Washington, DC 20024, or File on line: www.fcc.gov 

12 WM 



INTERNET & RADIO RESOURCES 

Prometheus Radio 



Internet Audio Resources 

http:lhvivw.freespeech.org 

This site is a great web site to go to first, to 
learn how to produce your program. Once you 
create your show, they even provide you with 
space on their server for members. 
Membership is free for non-commercial use 
with storage space of 25Mb with ftp access. 
Paid members receive more services and stor- 
age with commercial content allowed. Free 
Speech Internet Television is the first, and 
only, audio / video webcasting site created 
entirely by its members. You can join and 
begin broadcasting your own Internet "televi- 
sion channel" or "talk radio" show within 
days. Free Speech Internet Television uses 
Real Audio/Video as their standard format. 
http://www.real.coin 

RealNetworks is the pioneer in streaming 
media technology on the Internet. You can 
dowrrload free or commercial software from 
RealNetworks to create and listen to audio 
files. You can also download free basic server 
software that supports up to 25 live sessions 
and on-demand streaming of audio and video. 

The Radio Project 

http://radio4all.web.net/ 

From their web site: The A- infos Radio 
Project was formed by grassroots broadcast- 
ers, free radio journalists and cyber-activists 
to provide themselves with the means to share 
their radio programs via the Internet. Their 
goal is to support and expand the movement 
for democratic communications worldwide. 
They exist to be an alternative to the corpo- 
rate and government media which do not 
serve struggles for liberty, justice and peace, 
nor enable the free expression of creativity. 
The archived material on their web site is 
available to anyone who wants it, free of 
charge. 

They welcome submissions from all sta- 
tions and independent producers in the ser- 
vice of these goals. All material is donated by 
its producers who are solely responsible for its 
content. The Radio Project Archive uses the 
MPEG audio compression system for its files. 
Instruction and download links to get free or 
commercial software for MPEG audio is linked 
from their site. For more information about 
MPG visit http://wwui.mpeg.org/ 



Audio on the Web- 
The IUMA Official Guide 

by Jeff Patterson and Ryan Melcher 

Peachpit Press 

203 pages 

Price: $34.95 

ISBN: 0-201-69613-4 

Read the review of this book here: 

http://webreview. com/wripub/98/ 1 0/23/book- 

ends/index. html 

"As authors Jeff Patterson and Ryan 
Melcher explain, this book is the one they 
wish they had when they founded the Internet 
Underground Music Archive (IUMA). Their 
book is written in a simple, conversational 
style, and blankets the entire subject in a very 
readable and understandable way, especially 
for audio novices." 

Internet Resources for MicroRadio 
Radio4AII 

http://www.radio4all.org 

This site connects you to the movement to 
reclaim the airwaves. 

Micropower Broadcasting 
- A Technical Primer 

http://www.radio4all.org/how-lo.htm! 

From the web site: "Many people still 
assume that an FM broadcast station consists 
of rooms full of equipment costing tens of 
thousands of dollars. The Micropower 
Broadcasting, Free Radio Movement has 
shown this to be untrue. Micropower broad- 
casting uses FM transmitters whose power 
output is in the range of 1 12 to 40 watts. Such 
transmitters have a physical size that is not 
greater than that of your average brick. These 
transmitters combined with other equipment 
including inexpensive audio mixers, con- 
sumer audio gear, a power supply, filter and 
antenna enable any community to put its own 
voice on the air at an average cost of $1000- 
$1500. This is far more affordable than the 
tens or hundreds of thousands required by the 
current FCC regulatory structure." 

Federal Communications Commission [FCC] 

h Up: I I www.fcc.gov 

Link to the news release about proposed 
licensed low power FM radio. 
http://www.fcc.gov/liureaus/Mass_Media/lNe 
ws_Releases/1999/nrmm9003.html 

- Bob Russell 



Project Advocates 
Open Air Waves 

by Sara Zia Ebrahimi 

^jWe Prometheus Radio Project is a 
1.-/ not-for-profit association of micro- 
radio activists from Philadelphia and 
New York City. We draw our name from 
the Greek myth of Prometheus, who was 
punished for spreading the knowledge 
of fire among humans. In that spirit, we 
are a group dedicated to the democrati- 
zation of the airwaves through the pro- 
liferation of non-commercial, commu- 
nity based, micropower stations. It is 
our belief that access to communica- 
tions for all citizens is at the heart of a 
democratic society. 

Community-based radio broadcast- 
ing was once accessible until the FCC's 
repeal of the Class D license in 1976. in 
the past five years a movement of 
microbroadcasters has emerged who 
have engaged in civil disobedience by 
broadcasting without a license. Our 
organizing efforts are having an effect; 
in January 1999 the FCC issued a Notice 
of Proposed Rule Making (NPRM) to 
create a low-power FM service. 

Prometheus is currently composing 
comments on the rulemaking. We feel 
strongly that this new service be strictly 
. non-commercial. We are encouraging 
other community media groups to file 
comments to that effect as well. One of 
the key components of our comments 
to the Commission is the proposal to 
guarantee at least one public access 
model radio station in each community 
or "market". This will insure that in the 
unfortunate case that the new service is 
primarify commercial there be at least 
one non-commercial community-based 
stations in each city. We are suggesting 
that these stations be run by low-power 
TV and community media centers. 

We are looking for feedback from 
you as to whether or not this is some- 
thing of interest to you all and how we 
may logistically begin the process in 
preparation! We are also preparing an 
"abridged guide" to the NPRM to aid in 
the process of submitting comments. A 
draft of our comments along with other 
information about Prometheus is avail- 
able on our web page at 
//prometheits.tao.ca. You can also email 
us at prp@tap.ca or call (212) 946-5251. 



The Benton Foundation Open Studio Project 

Strengthening the Arts Community 
Through Communication Technology 



by Jan Koopman 

I efolie needs to tell the pub- 
/ 1/ lie access community about 
I. ' i the fundamental value of 
access to information for the health 
of a democratic society. The 
Petition for Media Democracy 
states, "To flourish, democracy 
depends on the ability of people to 
communicate ideas, share opinions 
and get information." 

Most information delivery and 
exchange is now and will continue 
to be via electronic means. The 
public access community has 
worked long and hard to promote 
its efforts; working witir local gov- 
ernments on sharing of franchise 
fees, defending First Amendment 
rights to those who are uncomfort- 
able with controversial program- 
ming, and training citizens in 
media literacy and technology to 
bring their opinions and issues into 
die public forum. All of us continue 
to bring in new people to join in 
our campaign to assure the vitality 
of our democracy. We all appreciate 
the value of partnerships to assist 
us in fulfilling our mission. 

The Open Studio 
f h Up:!! www. openstudio.org I 
www.openstiidio.org) project is one 
such partnership. Launched in 
1996, the Open Studio project is a 
Benton Foundation program in 
partnership with the National 
Endowment for the Arts, with addi- 
tional support from Microsoft, AT&T 
and the Ford Foundation, to build 
community through public service 
media. The Benton Foundation works "to 
realize the social benefits made possible 
by the public interest use of communica- 
tions." 

The project's ultimate goal is to insure 
the arts community's involvement in cre- 
ating, using and accessing public space. 
To accomplish the goal, phase one of the 
project selected mentor sites to train 
artists and arts organizations. In this first 

14 «I 




Top: Space One Eleven (AL). Center left: DC Commission on 
the Arts, Washington DC. Center right: Mattress Factory (PA) 
Bottom: Seattle Art Museum (WA) 



phase begun in 1997, 10 Mentor sites 
from around the country provided web 
training programs for artists and arts 
organizations and taught basic skills 
needed for online communications and 
electronic publishing, such as how to use 
email and build web sites. Selected men- 
tor sites included state and regional arts 
councils, artists' organizations and com- 
munity networks. Because few organiza- 



tions came into the program with 
both technological and arts back- 
grounds; most mentor sites part- 
nered with other organizations to 
bring in a balance of skills. Also in 
the first phase, arts organizations, 
libraries and community centers 
were funded to establish more than 
70 points of free Internet access 
around the country. These access 
points provide another avenue to 
make online arts and cultural 
information more accessible for 
the public, increase the amount of 
cultural material available online 
and expand the audience for such 
material. All Open Studio partici- 
pants were part of the on-line 
"community of learners" to share 
their best practices and exchange 
their lessons learned while imple- 
menting their Open Studio pro- 
gram. 

In phase two of the program, 
the Benton Foundation required 
mentor sites to target underserved 
artists and arts organizations with- 
out computer experience. Ten new 
Open Studio mentor sites were 
announced this past winter and all 
mentor sites, ranging from Buffalo 
to Hawaii and from state arts 
councils to art museums to public 
access television, met together in 
Minneapolis in February to share 
ideas, successes and failures and 
plan together to find ways to sus- 
tain this effort, while targeting the 
underserved artistic community. 
The need to target underserved 

communities is documented in 

The Benton Foundation publication 
Losing Ground Bit by Bit: Low-Income 
Communities in the Information Age 
(h ttpjlwww, ben ton.org/Lib rary! 
Low-Income) highlights the growing dis- 
parity between technology "haves" and 
"have nots" and the implications for the 
further fractionalizing of society if this 
trend continues. As digital technology 
brings new opportunities to many, it can 



aggravate the poverty and isolation of some rural areas 
and inner cities as good jobs, quality health care and edu- 
cation, and technological tools move to the suburbs. 

The lack of access to technology in underserved sec- 
tors of the artistic community can be ameliorated through 
the Open Studio project. By requiring phase two mentor 
sites to target underserved artists and arts organizations, 
the partners hope to make a positive impact in bridging 
the technology gap. 

Media Working Group (MWG) in Covington, Kentucky- 
was one of the initial mentor sites selected for the Open 
Studio project. MWG's project participants came from a 
wide area stretching from Cleveland to Atlanta and provid- 
ed on- and off-site training. In phase two, MWG will work 
on building a communications network to link partici- 
pants and plans to host an on-line gallery "opening" at the 
close of the project. 

In contrast, the Community Media Center (CMC) in 
Grand Rapids, Michigan is a new mentor site and plans to 
target its training specifically within Grand Rapids, almost 
exclusively on-site and heavily targeted to underserved 
artists. The CMC is partnering with a downtown ecumeni- 
cal homeless ministry, an existing arts program, and a 
large multidisciplinary contemporary arts center. The 
CMC is exploring sustainability through developing part- 
nerships with local foundations that have already 
expressed an interest in community building through the 
arts. CMC is unique in that it incorporates not only the 
computing and technological capacity required by Open 
Studio, but also public access television and community 
radio. The CMC intends to use these forms of media to fur- 
ther promote the artists and arts that participate in the 
project. 

Each Open Studio mentor site brings a unique skill set 
to the effort; each community is different, each curriculum 
is specifically designed to meet the needs of its partici- 
pants. Mentor sites have discovered that partnerships 
must be developed where our interests intersect and that 
we really are more the same than different. The technolog- 
ically and the artistically inclined speak the same lan- 
guage, only the dialects are different. 

Those of us in the public access com munity ha ve 
forged partnerships for many years for the purpose of 
guaranteeing citizen access to telecommunications media. 
We must be ready, willing, able and enthusiastic about 
developing new partnerships that allow all members of 
society to be enriched through the expression and appre- 
ciation of artistic endeavor. 

A wealth of on-line information about the Benton 
Foundation (http://www.benton.org), the Open Studio 
Project (http://www.openstuio.org) and the National 
Endowment for the Arts (http:llarts.endow.gov) is available. 
This project demonstrates another way that the public 
access community can be intricately involved in positive 
social change. 

Jan Koopman is Development Director for the Grand 
Rapids [MI} Community Media Center.Contact her at 
6J6.459.4788, or email jan@grcmc.org 





MTN/lntermedia Arts (MN) exhibition opening for trainees Web site 



OPEN STUDIO MENTOR SITES 

The following organizations were selected to participate 
in Open Studio as Mentor Sites. These organizations are pro- 
viding arts organizations and individual artists with the train- 
ing to use the World Wide Web to communicate, share infor- 
mation, and link effectively to other arts sites on the Web. 

Original sites 

Break Away Technologies (Los Angeles, CA) 
Center for Arts Management & Technology, (Pittsburgh, PA) 
Colorado Council on the Arts (Denver, CO) 
Charlotte'sWeb, (Charlotte, NC) 
Leeward Community College (Pearl City, HI) 
Minneapolis Telecommunications Network 
and Intermedia Arts (Minneapolis, MN) 
Media Working Group (Covington, KY) 
New England Foundation for the Arts (Boston, MA) 
Seattle Art Museum (Seattle, VVA) 
Space One Eleven (Birmingham, AL) 

New sites 

Community Media Center (Grand Rapids, MI) 
Information Technology Resource Center 

& Mexican Fine Arts Museum (Chicago, IL) 
Ink People Center for the Arts (Eureka, CA) 
La Plaza Telecommunity (Taos, NM) 
Lewis- Clark State College (Lewiston, ID) 
Media Alliance (San Francisco, CA) 
Nebraska Arts Council (Lincoln, NE) 
Squeaky Wheel/Buffalo Media Resources & Center 

for Exploratory and Perceptual Art (Buffalo, NY) 
Tucson- Pima Arts Council (Tucson, AZ) 
Visual Communications (Los Angeles, CA). 



lilli 



SOCIAL MEDIA MOVEMENTS IN MESOAMERICA 



*What we need is a decentralized intercontinental network of alternative communication 9 



by Jeff Sn 

X^S Neol: 




by Jeff Smith 

^1996, at the global 
gathering against 
Neoliberalism, 
Zapatista spokesperson 
Marcos said "what we need 
is a decentralized interconti- 
nental network of alternative 
communication." This state- 
ment is all the more relevant 
when considering the cur- 
rent global consolidation of 
media conglomerates as 
documented in Ed Herman 
and Bob McChesney's 
important book The Global 
Media. 

Much can be learned 
from the visionary practices 
of the Zapatistas and other 
popular movements 
throughout Mesoamerica, a 
region that is blossoming in 
new social media move- 
ments. My first social media 
encounter was in 1992 while 
in El Salvador. The Peace 
Accords were about to be 
signed that would end a 12 
year bloody counterinsur- 
gency war. We visited a non governmental human rights office 
to gather information on the peace process. While waiting to see 
the director we encountered the music of the pop/rock band U2 
coming from one of the rooms. Curious to see what this was we 
came upon an video editing room, where Salvadorans were 
making documentary films of the current situation for English 
speaking audiences. 

This video documentary outpost was a collaborative effort 
between labor groups, the university, human rights organiza- 
tions, and the left party FMLN. Two years later while acting as an 
election observer in El Salvador I again encountered members of 
this video collective. Now they were producing videos for their 
own countiy as well. A few years of attempting to work with the 
private media taught them that they need to create their own if 
their message was to reach the masses. 

Now when holding press conferences, they would not only 
organize them, they would tape them to provide access to 
Salvadorans who did not own TV's. They would hold public 
video showings in neighborhoods all over the city to create 
greater news access. This strategy also proved to be a major 
organizing tool for these groups who sought a seat at the politi- 
cal table. 

In 1995, 1 received a grant to purchase a Hi-8 video camera to 



...when holding press conferences, they would 
not only organize them, they would tape them to 
provide access to Salvadorans who did not own 
TV's. They would hold public video showings in 
neighborhoods all over the city to create greater 
news access. This strategy also proved to be a major 
organizing tool for these groups who sought a seat 
at the political table. 



monitor the elections in 
Guatemala. After spending a 
mondr taping and observing 
the election process, I was 
then required by the grant to 
give the camera to a local 
human rights organization. 
Having worked with the 
Mayan group CERJ [a Mayan 
anacronym for Ethnic 
Communities of We Are All 
Equal] on many occasions 
they seemed like an appro- 
priate group to receive the 
camcorder. 

CERJ had been document- 
ing human rights abuses 
since 1988. This documenta- 
tion was in the form of writ- 
ten and verbal testimonies 
from victims or witnesses of 
human rights abuses com- 
mitted in the countryside. 
Much of the population is 
geographically isolated from 
other communities and 
since there are 23 different 
Mayan languages in use in 
Guatemala, communication 
w r as at times difficult. Video 
taping people's testimonies now gave them another mechanism 
to share information, with images. Regardless of the language 
barriers, people could clearly understand the images. 

The \ideo footage was not only used with the UN human 
rights team in Guatemala, but again as a social networking tool 
that helped rural communities realize they were not the only vic- 
tims of political 
repression. Since then j 
new video projects 
have grown in the 
country. 

One of the more 
ambitious efforts is 
by a group of 
women known as 
the Cent.ro de 
Mujeres 

Communicadoras 
Mayas [see side- 
bar next page]. They offer video 
and internet assistance to other indigenous people to 
broaden their free speech capabilities. In addition, they provide 
three-week seminars for foreigners who want to make documen- 




16 T 



taries about Mayans, assisting in cultural sensitivity and 
political consciousness raising. 

The last example of social media is in Chiapas, Mexico 
where for the past two years I have been spending three 
weeks around the New Year's in Zapatista communities. It is 
here that I have experienced the mostly lively forms of social 
media in the region. 

The Zapatistas (named after the Mexican revolutionary 
leader Emiliano Zapata) are a primarily indigenous move- 
ment in Chiapas that have been organizing for social change 
for the past 15 years, against what they often refer to as 500 
years of oppression. They began the armed component of 
their uprising on January 1, 1994, the day that NAFTA would 
take effect. They refer to NAFTA as a death sentence, primari- 
ly because as an economic treaty it is further marginalized 
them on the state, national, and international scene. To date 
they have formed 26 autonomous communities in order to 
put forth their vision of a more participatory democracy for 
Mexicans. 

The Zapatistas very early on recognized the importance of 
how people would perceive their movement. Therefore, it was 
important for them to take a proactive approach to commu- 
nicating their ideas and demands. Utilizing the social net- 
works that were created in North America during the NAFTA 
debates, the Zapatistas disseminated their messages through- 
out the world without ever leaving the Lacandon forest. 

Today this has translated into more Chiapas and Zapatista 
websites than any other political movement in the world. 
How can this be? This is a group of a few hundred thousand 
Mayans in a remote area of Mexico. The answer has already 
been stated.. .they utilized existing social networks. 

Two of the many sites for Accion Zapatista include 
www.utexas.edu/ftp/student/nave/ and www.ezln.org/ 

It is extremely important for those of us in materially priv- 
ileged communities to not put the cart before the horse. What 
makes the social media movements so dynamic is that what 
they rely on, and build on, is the social networks they have 
created. This is achieved mostly through an awful lot of orga- 
nizing and hard work, but just as importantly, they have been 
able to communicate the interconnectedness of their lives 
with our lives. 

It was no coincidence that the day the Zapatistas uprising 
began was the same day that NAFTA was to go into affect. 
With the further globalization of the economy and informa- 
tion seen more as a commodity, it is extremely important that 
those of us who believe in social justice see social media as 
essential in our work. We can no longer afford to separate our 
work from that of communities all around the globe. 

"It is the word which is the bridge to cross to the other. 
Silence is what the powerful offer our pain in order to make 
us small. When we are silenced we remain very much alone. 
Speaking heals the pain. Speaking we encounter one anotli- 
er ' - Zapatista communique 

Let us not be silent ! 

Jeff Smith is the director of the Grand Rapids Institute for 
Media Democracy, an affiliate of the Grand Rapids [MI] Com- 
munity Media Center. He may be reached atjsmith@grcmc.org, 
telephone 616.459.4788. 




CENTRO DE MUJERES 
COMUNICADORAS MAYAS 

s^l f alare a non-profit access center run by indigenous 
f/f ^Guatemalan women. We offer internet access and edu- 
/ y cation to the rural Mayan community around Lake 
Atitlan, We support free speech, international awareness and 
local microenterprise. You can support women here by distrib- 
uting this information and inviting people to come produce 
with them - a co-learning experience in culture, communica- 
tion, human rights, women in development, and in shaping, 
shooting and editing a video documentary in a contemporary 
world of egalitarian media. 

Tm: Center of Mayan Women Communicators presents three 
weeks of Participator}' Documentary Making. Complete a docu- 
mentary, from concept to product, with a Guatemalan partner. 
Share perspectives, ideas and credit for the work. 

Themes: women, education, rainforest flora and fauna, herbal 
healing, Mayan weaving and handicrafts, environment and 
local problems, healthcare, midwifery, traditions, gender, chil- 
dren.. .or present your own and we will find a coproducer inter- 
ested in your topic. 

Use our Cameras and Professional Editing Bay 
Professional consultation in research and planning, using the 
equipment, working as a team, avoiding racist and sexist para- 
digms, interviewing techniques, cutaways, ethics and distribu- 
tion. VHS master tape included - optional Hi8 or Betacam SP 
for extra charge 

Cost: $1,200 USD 

Includes: 3 weeks work, 5 day minimum each. 
Workshops: theoretical and hands-on video shoots and hands- 
on co-edit optional housing with a family and 3 meals a day. 
Most transportation, translator, Spanish tutor available for an 
extra charge. 

http:llrds.org.gt/cmcm/pardocMml 

Centro de Mujeres Comiinicaooras Mayas 

http://rds.org.gl/ctncm/ 
Panajachel, Solola, Guatemala 
(502) 762-2978 



III 17 



■ ritical Questions & 
a Reflections. For almost 30 
I / f years, public access television 

advocates have worked passion- 
ately to utilize electronic media to facili- 
tate individual empowerment and com- 
munity change. From the Access pio- 
neers in Canada's Challenge for Change 
project who sought to "improve commu 
nications, create greater understanding, 
promote new ideas, and pro- 
voke social change" to com- 
munity television (CTV (cen- 
ters around the U.S. today, 
access workers have endeav- 
ored to help people use media 
tools as a way to participate in 
civic affairs. The mission state- 
ments of many access centers 
around the country reflect 
CTV's community develop- 
ment vision. The main avenue 
most centers use to opera- 
tionalize this vision is CTV 
training programs. 

in the past several years, a 
number of researchers and 
practitioners have started to . 
question if the training meth- 
ods frequently used in CTV are 
aligned with the access mis- 
sion of using media tools for 
social and community devel- 
opment. 

In my experience working 
in and around access training 
over the past eight years, I 
have found that most CTV 
centers focus on quickly 
teaching the greatest number 
of people how to operate equipment to 
make television shows. To me, this indi- 
cates an emphasis on producing pro- 
gramming to fill access channels rather 
than on how to use media as a means to 
engage the public in processes of indi- 
vidual and community betterment. 

Yet if the access mission is to use 
media as a means to facilitate empower- 
ment, social change, or community 
development, then the focus of training 
programs should not be on technology, 
but rather on how people learn to work 
together to use technology to identify 
and communicate issues important to 
them, build critical thinking skills, and 
forge community coalitions in the 
process. 

Similar ideas have arisen in recent 
CTV literature. Bob Devine states that 
"The point is that access training be 



redirected in such a way that it involves 
social as well as technical learning... 
that the training sets up a 'culture of 
access' that values voice, the practice of 
culture, collectivized action, agency 
and social outcomes." Ron Burnett 
takes it one step further by sounding 
the call for new training models that 
include both makers and audiences: "It 




BUILDING CAPACITY THROUGH 
COMMUNITY VIDEO TRAINING 

THE DAVIS VIDEO PROJECT CASE STUDY 



by jesikah maria ross 

is also important to generate pedagogi- 
cal models that will encourage open 
and honest exchange among partici- 
pants in the production of videotapes 
as well as among the viewers who see 
them." John Higgins suggests reexamin- 
ing training programs to surface and 
resolve inconsistencies between access 
objectives and CTV teaching strategies: 

"In particular, the issue of training 
needs to be put on the table and scruti- 
nized. Do the methods we employ 
when teaching people how to create 
video programs follow the stated goals 
and beliefs of CTV?. ..The process of 
evaluation and change is not easy. It is 
not appropriate in all situations. It does 
involve rethinking if the why we do 
training in CTV fits the how we do this 
training." 

If access training were to move 



beyond its current focus of developing 
technical skills for producing local tele- 
vision programs to one that achieved the 
social benefits mission of CTV what 
would such a training program model 
look like? How would it be structured? 
What teaching methods and learning 
strategies could be used to achieve 
empowerment, social change, and com- 
munity development goals? A 
pilot training program I creat- 
ed and implemented may be 
able to provide some insights 
into diese questions. 

The Davis Video Project 
(DVP). The DVP brought 
together eight young Davis 
|CA| residents (ages 1 6 - 22) 
from different backgrounds to 
form a multicultural video 
production team. The project 
focused on participants learn- 
ing about each other, their 
city, and how to use the tools 
of television to stimulate 
community development 
around local, multicultural 
issues. Davis is a university 
town struggling to remain a 
cohesive community as it 
experiences the rapid popula- 
tion growth typical today in 
California. Located just 15 
miles west of Sacramento, the 
state capital, Davis has a pop- 
ulation of about 50,000. The 
vast majority of Davis resi- 
dents are European 
American. Over the past several years, 
however, the demographics of the city 
have been steadily diversifying. 

DVP training sessions, which were 
two and a half hours long, took place 
twice a week for drree months. 
Following the training, community 
screenings of participants' work 
occurred approximately four times a 
week for one month. The Davis Video 
Project was made possible by a grant 
from the Davis Civic Arts Commission in 
conjunction with in-kind donations of 
equipment, facilities, supplies, and 
administrative assistance from Davis 
Community Television (DCTV). 

What follows is a Reader's Digestvev- 
sion of the project in which I briefly out- 
line the DVP training model, highlight 
some project outcomes, and identify key 
implications evolving out of the Davis 



18 ©H 



Video Project, 

Training Program Model. The DVP 

training program consisted of three 
interrelated components: video produc- 
tion, community organizing, and com- 
munity screenings. Video production 
training focused on developing media 
literacy skills: the ability to access, ana- 
lyze, and produce television. We read 
and discussed public access TV history, 
did critical viewing activities, screened 
and discussed a wide variety of media 
work, learned how to operate DCTV pro- 
duction equipment, and collaborated in 
teams to make short videos. 

The community organizing compo- 
nent emphasized how to work as a 
group toward a common goal: bringing 
Davisites together to view 
and discuss videos which 
reflected the project par- 
ticipant's issues, ideas, 
and cultures. Each DVP 
participant was respon- 
sible for orchestrating a 
screening of the group's 
work at a community 
site. In the process, we 
learned how conduct 
community research 
(i.e., identify sites, 
sponsors, and 
resources), create 
and implement out 
reach plans, gener- 
ate promotional 
materials, and 
manage various 
logistics related to 
coordinating pub- 
lic events. 



Davis, and learning how to effectively 
participate in a group process. As DVP 
participant Mei-Ling put it: "I did learn 
about how to use the video equipment, 
but the technical aspect was not the 
reason why I am so affected by the pro- 
ject.. .In the group.. .1 received an educa- 
tion about people in general. The vari- 
ous personalities that sometimes 
clashed, but most of the time inspired 
each other, could not have demonstrat- 
ed better how people have the ability to 
come together and work towards a 
common goal." 

Three strategies I used to facilitate 
social learning were teambuilding, col- 
lective learning, and participatory deci- 
sionmaking. Teambuilding activities — 
having meals together, collaborating on 
project activities, 



The community screenings, 
which were free and open to the public, 
were followed by discussions facilitated 
by the DVP team. To prepare for these 
public events, team members did roles 
plays to build skills in facilitating group 
discussion, handling controversial com- 
ments, and speaking in front of groups. 
They also devised a format for introduc- 
ing the video presentation, a series of 
questions to stimulate a community 
conversation, and protocols for how to 
answer questions from the audience. 

Throughout the different training 
components, there was a focus on social 
as well as technical learning. The team 
spent time sharing personal stories, 
exploring feelings about the city of 




talking ct,on 'earn. 

about a time when partici- 
pants felt a sense of power — built trust, 
respect, and a sense of community 
among participants. Collective learning 
occtirred by creating opportunities for 
participants to teach and learn from 
one another. The program promoted 
participatory decisionmaking by having 
team members deliberate and decide 
collectively on the project goals, time- 
lines, and work plans. This deepened 
participant investment and ownership 
of project outcomes and helped build 
their skills and confidence in managing 
a group endeavor. All these strategies 
contributed to forming a close-knit and 



16 



potent learning community. As DVP 
team member Xavier notes: "We all 
decided to trust each other, and enter 
the circle with our most personal expe- 
riences or feelings about ourselves. I 
never really shared such deep feelings 
within myself with others., .the environ- 
ment was so "warm and trusting.. .1 
found that all of our differences some- 
how made us closer and perhaps more 
trusting with each other...! have never 
been in a group like this before in my 
entire life, 1 became friends with people 
who are completely opposite from me. 
It gave me a little more hope for the 
world I live in." 

What Happened: Individual and 
Community Impact. Working collabo- 
ratively, the project team created a 70 
minute video presentation focused on 
cultural diversity in our community. 

Their videos tackled a wide 
range of topics, 
including powerful 
personal stories 
addressing racism, 
rape, sexual orien- 
[[•jf tation, and cultural 
I stereotypes The 
ideos were shown in 

■ ; Davis churches, com- 

■ inunity centers, 
schools, local busi- 

1 nesses, as well as on 
/ the public access chan- 
nel. By having 18 
screenings, the DVP 
team received broad vis- 
ibility for their work, 
particularly in areas not 
typically presented with 
local multicultural media 
programs and individuals 
who do not receive cable 
TV 

22 > from The community 

screenings, packed with a 
diverse range of people, were followed 
by open discussions in which commu- 
nity members could relate their ideas 
and experiences or talk about issues 
brought up in the videos. Through this 
forum, the project participants were 
able to facilitate a robust conversation 
that touched on many more community 
issues than were covered by the 19 
videos they presented. Just as the 
screenings sites varied, so too did atten- 
dance at the different community 
events. Some community screenings 
had twelve people in the audience while 



1M19 




The project stimulated interest in civic participation using 
media tools among participants as well as audience mem- 
bers. It engaged community members around local concerns 
and inspired project participants to continue to make posi- 
tive change in their communities. In this way, the DVP 
achieved the empowerment, social change, and community 
development goals of the access television movement. 



others had about 40 attendees. On aver- 
age, about 20 people attended each 
screening, and we estimate that about 
275 people total came out to the com- 
munity programs. 

Judging from the 164 project evalua- 
tions collected from audiences at the 
community screenings, the DVP had a 
clear community impact. Bringing 
diverse community members together 
to view videos on local issues and cul- 
tures and engage in constructive discus- 
sions about mutual needs and concerns 
resulted in increased: 

A dialogue on a range of cultural 
issues and histories; 

A appreciation of cultural diversity 
in Davis, a quickly growing semi-rural 
community; 

▲ awareness of cultural resources 
available to community members; 

A understanding of the power and 
potential of self-representation through 
community media; 

A recognition of video as a tool for 
initiating public dialogue and forging 
public opinion, resulting in an increased 
interest in becoming involved in com- 
munity television. 

Based on information collected 
through participant questionnaires, 
interviews, and journal writings, the 
DVP experience built team member's 
capacity [skills, confidence, and motiva- 
tion) to: 

A work across differences of gender, 
ethnicity, age, sexual preference and cul- 
tural backgrounds towards a common 
goal; 

A make group decisions and wo rk 
collectively; 

A analyze and produce media mes- 
sages; 

A identify and address issues of con- 
cern in our community; 

A use media tools for creative self- 
expression and community building; 

A organize, publicize, and facilitate 
public events; 

A speak in front of groups, including 
the city council, the city human rela- 
tions commission, university and local 
high school classes, and social action 
groups. 

Perhaps the most telling result from 
the project is that fact that all eight DVP 
participants indicated that they plan to 
continue making videos as well as par- 
ticipate in community groups. And they 



have. More than a year after completing 
the project, at least four team members 
are still making videos. Three others 
continue to be involved in community 
media work. One participant, for 
instance, now serves on the DCTV 
board of directors. Another works on an 
Asian-American community newspaper 
and a third is organizing a statewide 
Asian American Zine conference. They 
are making a difference in their com- 
munities. One participant, for example, 
decided to switch from pursuing a 
career in criminology to become a 
Teacher for America in a inner- city, 
multi-ethnic community. 

The Davis Video Project resulted in 
individual and community capacity 
building. Participants increased their 
media literacy skills and ability to col- 
laborate on community endeavors. 
They developed a sense of self- direc- 
tion and agency regarding civic affairs 
as well as the confidence and ability to 
attain self- and group-identified goals. 
The project stimulated interest in civic 
participation using media tools among 
participants as well as audience mem- 
bers. It engaged community members 



around local concerns and inspired pro- 
ject participants to continue to make 
positive change in their communities. In 
this way, die DVP achieved the empow- 
erment, social change, and community 
development goals of the access televi- 
sion movement. 

Implications 

1 started off this article with con- 
cerns about CTV training that led to the 
question: what would a training pro- 
gram model that encouraged empower- 
ment, social change, and community 
development look like? Based on my 
experience with the Davis Video Project, 
some answers to the question include: 
teach community organizing in addition 
to equipment training; include commu- 
nity screenings and discussions as part 
of tire training program; use teambuild- 
ing activities to create a learning com- 
munity; focus on group process by 
encouraging collective learning and par- 
ticipatory decision-making (see sidebar 
next page). Additional considerations 
for such a program model include creat- 
ing longer training programs and craft- 
ing programs that center on specific 
themes or content areas. 



20&m 



Access practitioners will immediate- 
ly notice problems posed by the ideas 
oudined above. Longer training pro- 
grams require reallocating scarce 
resources. Content-driven or theme- 
based training necessitates a philosoph- 
ical shift from the current "content neu- 
tral" training orientation of many access 
centers. The model also implies skill sets 
that many trainers may not possess, 
such as facilitating group process and 
community organizing, as well as some 
understanding of experiential education 
and participatory learning. 

These issues are not insurmount- 
able. They do, however, require creative 
problem solving and a willingness to 
explore new ideas and practices. One 
step towards moving in the direction of 
this model would be to conduct training 
of trainers to build access practitioners' 
knowledge and capabilities in areas such 
as community education and critical 
pedagogy, fields rich with history and 
research-based practices. 

The training program outlined in 
this article is intended as a model. 
Models are useful as guides and are 
meant to be adapted according to differ- 
ent needs atid resources. Like all mod- 
els, further testing and evaluation will 
help make it more effective. And the 
more effective our training programs, 
the better able Access advocates will be 
in reaching their organizational and 
movement-wide vision. 

jesikah maria ross is a community 
development practitioner and community 
media, training consultant based in Davis, 
CA. She is board chair of The Learning 
Commons, a non-profit organization made 
up of educators and community organizers, 
and a facility member for The Community 
Media Leadership Institute. She also teaches 
media and development courses at UC 
Davis. She can be reached at 
jmross@ucdavis.edu. 



SUGGESTIONS FOR TRAINING STRATEGIES 



Based on my experience with the Davis Video Project, here are suggestions for 
training strategies that build participants' capacity for empowerment, social 
change, and community development. 

A Develop a learner-centered curriculum. 

The learner's needs, experiences and goals are central to creating an appropri- 
ate training curriculum. Emphasis is placed on learner's developing abilities 
and skills to diagnose and solve their own problems or address their current 
issues and concerns. 

A Assess training needs. 

Conduct a needs assessment prior to a training to identify die specific skills, 
information, values, etc. individuals, group or community desire to learn. 
Determine with participants the types of training activities that best meet their 
needs. 

A Take on a facilitator role. 

The trainer facilitates a process of competency-building and self-discovery for 
the learners, rather than imparts knowledge. Participants are viewed as the 
"experts" who best understand their issues, culture, ideas, and needs. The 
training process is developed as a mutual learning experience. 

A Focus on activities that develop analysis, planning, 
and problem-solving skills. 

Structure learning sessions as experiential problem-solving activities or tasks. 
Provide the simple structure of the problem-solving activity or task but allow 
the content to come mainly from the learners. Place an emphasis developing 
action plans that focus on community impact. 

A Encourage questioning and investigation of reality. 

Create an atmosphere where all participants (including the trainer) can 
express themselves freely, ask questions and learn. Provide opportunities for 
participants to express and understand their perceptions of reality with rela- 
tion to others in the group. An atmosphere of trust and respect builds a learn- 
ing community, develops participants skills in collaboration, and encourages 
collective effort. 

A Encourage collective learning and decision-making. 

Place a strong emphasis on problem-solving activities that require teamwork 
and open peer discussion. Provide opportunities for the group to make deci- 
sions based on their learning and experience. Devote time to sharing experi- 
ences among the group to develop participant confidence in analyzing and 
finding solutions to local problems. 

A Integrate evaluation throughout training. 

Integrate simple forms of evaluation (graffiti wall, anonymous card drop, 
like/ dislike go around) throughout the training to ensure that the curriculum 
(activities, emphasis, time allocation) is meeting participant needs. Effort 
should be made to alter the training to satisfy participant needs as much as 
possible. Always address participant concerns in a public setting whether you 
can do something about it or not. 



-jessikah maria ross 



CITIZENS NETWORK PROJECT 

Making a difference in the shift from an industrial-based 
economy towards a service-based one in Santo Andre, Brazil 



by Rodrigo Ortiz Assumpcao 

i writing from Brazil, from the city of Sanlo Andre to be 
f exact. What I would like to share with you in this message 
\.^/ is an ongoing project to use information and communica- 
tions technology to help hridge the ever widening gap between 
the haves and the have nots in our society 7 . 

A significant part of Brazilian society is adapting to the 
Internet with all it brings in terms of speed, charm and advan- 
tages as ducks to water. This segment of Brazil, a richer and 
more developed segment is taking on the challenge of connec- 
tivity and information technology [IT] with glee and abandon. 
Our country already boasts one of the 
largest rates of Internet growth and comput- 
er presence on the globe. 

Parallel to this process, however, the 
huge disparities that exist in the world's 
worst income distribution averages are get- 
ling deeper and graver. The challenge of 
dealing with illiteracy is greatly increased by 
having to deal at the same time with com- 
puter illiteracy. Building and strengthening 
the public sphere in a media and communi- 
cation environment not committed to val- 
ues such as distribution of wealth and power 
is made more and more difficult for those 
who do not navigate the Internet nor are 
connected to cyberspace. Gradually, access 
to basic citizenship rights are being more 
and more determined by the access to and domain of ITs. I he 
issue is power and IT is, more and more, the medium with 
which power can be obtained, bargained and brokered. Thus, 
empowering communities to use IT seems to us one of the keys 
to a more equal, just and peaceful future. 

With these perceptions in mind the Citizens Network Project 
started to take form in the city' of Santo Andre in the state of Sao 
Paulo in the southeast of Brazil. This city is located in the metro- 
politan area of Sao Paulo. It is an industrial town of 700,000 peo- 
ple that presents dire contrasts such as can only be found when 
immense wealth meets immense poverty. So in this background 
of a medium sized city, with lots of difficulties and undergoing 
an economic shift from an industrial -based economy towards a 
service- based one the Citizens Network is helping to make a dif- 
ference. 

Trying to lead this process in a participatory and democratic 
manner, the local government has committed itself to change 
the usual priorities, to promote the development of the city 
through a greater and more just distribution of wealth and 
opportunities. One of the forms this government has chosen to 
do this is by supporting the Citizens Network Project. 

The project tries to tap into public, private and international 
resources to set up a network of community computer centers, a 
media lab, school computer labs, libraries, and city hall's own 



Building and strengthening 
the public sphere in a media 
and communication envi- 
ronment not committed to 
values such as distribution 
of wealth and power is 
made more and more diffi- 
cult for those who do not 
navigate the Internet nor are 
connected to cyberspace. 



computer network acting as Internet Service Provider to the 
institutions of the civil society, and hosting their homepages. 
The idea goes like this: 

A Use the local government computer structure as a cost 
free ISP to encourage institutions such as regional organiza- 
tions, unions, community centers, neighborhood associations, 
popular movements, community media organizations, youth 
groups, women's groups, etc. to set up their homepages; 

A Use the local government's site as a nucleus of a larger 
and public city site built by joining in a public portal all the sites 
hosted by the mayorship and set up a community committee to 
run the show; 

A Use some of the public school's 20 
computer labs as part-time community 
computer centers to allow people to access 
all these sites, also to train enable the com- 
munity to acquire the skills and abilities nec- 
essary to use IT; 

A. Set up Internet navigating rooms in 
the public libraries so the general public can 
use the city's public portal and all the sites 
connected; 

A Set up a media lab to develop more 
refined skills such as web publishing, digital 
television, digital radio and graphic design, 
then open it to the institutions and to the 
general public; 

A Use all these activities listed above to 
lever private support in terms of sponsorship, donations of soft- 
ware and hardware; 

A Seek international support, namely development funding 
from the European Union [funds soon to be released.) and from 
other international donors; 

A Consolidate the Project with technical support from uni- 
versities, volunteers from the community and help from the 
society in general. 

Some of these ideas, especially those dealing with communi- 
ty computer centers, were inspired by what we saw of the 
Playing To Win Network [now CTCNet] in the USA. We visited 
the original unit in Harlem, NY, the Clubhouse in Boston and 
also managed to meet and talk with Peter Miller, one of The 
organizers of the Network. All this was very inspirational for us. 

The project is still in its initial stages, all the pieces of the 
puzzle are on the table, but most have yet to fall in together and 
build a larger picture, however the interest and involvement is 
growing geometrically. We have great hopes for our efforts. 

The site for the city can be reached at 
http : / / www. santo andre.sp. gov. br 



Rodrigo Ortiz Assumpcao is a project, coordinator at the mayor- 
ship of Santo Andre. Email him at rodassumpcao@santoandre.sp. 
gou.br, or visit Santo Andre's website at http:Hsantoandre.sp.gov.br. 



22mm 



mam mm a 



i-Contact Video Network Promotes 
Using Video for Positive Change 

http://www.gifford.co.uk/i-contact 

i- Contact Video Network is a non-profit initiative set up to 
provide support for those using video for positive change. This 
includes progressive, alternative and independent video makers 
and video activists. Although based in the UK (Bristol), i-Contact 
Video Network is keen to cooperate and work with individuals 
and groups all over the world. 
Who are we? 

i-Contact is a non-profit group producing and supporting 
video work that tackles the issues the mainstream media ignore. 
Through i-Contact those wishing to use video come together 
with those who will benefit from it. We arc about respecting and 
reflecting the genuine concerns of communities and suggesting 
ways forward. 

Why was i-Contact established? 

A tiny minority decide what is and isn't seen on television, i- 
Contact wants to make it as easy as possible for anybody to make 
programs, It advocates genuine public access to TV and individ- 
ual empowerment. 

Anew approach through a collaborative process, i-Contact 
brings a fresh approach to media, communicating with, rather 
than at, people. By involving those who know about and are 
affected by the issues in the production process, people are 
brought together, skills are transferred, and the media is demysti- 
fied. i-Contact wants anyone to feel able to use video to express 
his or her concerns and visions. 

i-Contact also runs an email list for video journalists/acti- 
vists, alternative and community video. 

WebRing for Alternative Video 
Helps Spread the Word 

h tip:/ /www. ainfos. cal 

A - Infos News Service has set up a WebRing for Alternative 
Video and invites anyone with a suitable website to join it. 
What is a WebRing? 

A WebRing is a group of sites with something in common 
who decide to cooperate. Each member of the ring puts a 
WebRing banner somewhere prominent on their site. This ban- 
ner allows people visiting the site to visit other sites on the Ring. 

It also allows them to get a list of all the sites on the WebRing 
and a short description for each of them. In this way all the 
members of the ring can increase the traffic to their site. The 
beauty of WebRings is that the people who visit your site as a 
result of them are already interested in the subject of your site. 

For more information about WebRings go to 
http:llwww. webring. o rgl 

To find out more or join the Alternative Video WebRing go to 
http://www.gifford.co.uk/i-contact/webring.html 

more on page 24 



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continued from page 23 

Aboriginal Peoples 
Television Network 
Approved in Canada 

The Canadian Radio-Television 
Telecommunications Commission 
(CRTC) announced that effective 
September 1999, the Aboriginal 
Peoples Television Network (APTN) 
will be carried on basic cable 
throughout Canada. 

"I am tremendously excited by the 
opportunity the aboriginal people of 
Canada have been given. This historic 
decision will be a major step in build- 
ing bridges of understanding between 
aboriginal and non-aboriginal people 
of Canada," stated Abraham Tagalik, 
TVNC Chairman. The CRTC decision 
paves the way for the world's first 
national, public aboriginal television 
network dedicated to stories by and 
about aboriginal people across 
Canada and around the world. "1 
applaud the progressive position 
taken by the CRTC to ensure that 
telecommunications in Canada fulfills 
its role to protect and nurture 
Canadian culture," added Mr. Tagalik. 
APTN is an enormous challenge for 
aboriginal Canadians. APTN is com- 
mitted to delivering a fall spectrum of 
high-quality programming that will 
build and sustain a dedicated audi- 
ence. 

APTN will broadcast approximate- 
ly 120 hours per week of program- 
ming in English, French and aborigi- 
nal languages. APTN will build on the 
success of TVNC (Television Northern 
Canada). TVNC has provided quality 
aboriginal programming in northern 
Canada for the past seven years. The 
success of TVNC has created an 
awareness of the importance of com- 
municating aboriginal perspectives. It 
is logical that the success in the North 
should be extended across Canada. 
The new network will be national in 
scope and will allow aboriginal peo- 
pLe from all regions of Canada to 
share their stories. 



24 mm 



Do all human beings have the right to see, to hear, 
to speak, to communicate and to access information 
regardless of their life circumstances, their 
political or religious beliefs or their ability to pay? 
We say 'Yes!' If you agree with us, join. . . 




What you can do: 

□ Sign the Petition in Support of Media Democracy 

□ Support the Public Policy program of the Alliance — 
become a Public Policy Affiliate or Council member 

□ Write, call or visit your governmental representatives 

3 Write letters to the. editor in support of media access or call in 
to a radio talk show and talk about the importance of media democracy 

□ Talk to your friends about the issue — speak to community groups 
or invite someone to speak toyour gsvup about media democracy 

D join an Alliance Chapter— Attend a Regional Conference 
— Become active in your Alliance! 




Alliance for Community Media : 
666 11th Street l NW, Suite 806 
Washington DC 20001-4542 
202-393-2650 voice/ 202-393-2653 fax 
www. alliancecm. org 



:::.:::;:!::::,: !:.: ,::,: ^« 

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rogramming for learners and b 

am at. 1,300.228.8030 ext. 4 or chat 1 #r.org 

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-jt sicy and Smithsonian Efissmsiiyr* 




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